


Hell

by the_alchemist



Category: Richard III - Shakespeare
Genre: F/M, Hate Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-19
Updated: 2013-08-19
Packaged: 2017-12-24 01:17:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/933410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_alchemist/pseuds/the_alchemist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Richard III and Elizabeth Woodville's battle of words over Elizabeth's daughter is one of my favourite parts of Richard III. I love the subtly shifting balance of power, and I love the different things actors and directors do with the line "Bear her my true love's kiss".</p><p>The scene is perfect as it stands, and ends exactly as it should do, with Elizabeth triumphant, and Richard deceived (or desperate, and deceiving himself).</p><p>But. When I saw a prompt asking for Richard/Elizabeth hatesex, I couldn't resist taking further my favourite version of that line, the one where Richard kisses her, expecting her to be disgusted, but she responds in kind.</p><p>Obviously, given the prompt, there's all manner of nastiness, including ableism, slut-shaming, and perhaps dubcon, if dubcon can be utterly mutual.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hell

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).



_I mean, that with my soul I love thy daughter,_

_And mean to make her queen of England._

 

They fell into a pattern, echoing each other's words, copying each other's rhythms. She had heard him do it many times before: it was how he wooed and won Anne; it was how he wooed and won the realm.

She knew she didn't stand a chance. This was his own game, he had everything and she had nothing; was nothing. Her skull still echoed with the voice of Margaret, crowing the litany of her losses:

_For happy wife, a most distressed widow;_

_For joyful mother, one that wails the name;_

_For queen, a very caitiff crown'd with care._

 

And yet, when she heard her own voice, as something far distant, she heard an answer for everything he said:

_– Say, I, her sovereign, am her subject love._

_– But she, your subject, loathes such sovereignty._

_– Be eloquent in my behalf to her._

_– An honest tale speeds best being plainly told._

_– Then in plain terms tell her my loving tale._

_– Plain and not honest is too harsh a style._

_– Your reasons are too shallow and too quick._

 

"Oh no," she said, jolting back into herself. "My reasons are too deep and dead; too deep and dead, poor infants, in their grave."

And he opened his mouth, but shut it again. She held his gaze until he looked away. "Harp not on that string, madam," he muttered. "That is past."

And the truth unfolded before her: he is weak, he is afraid, he will lose the battle. For a moment, her heart was light, and she could have laughed like a little girl. She could promise anything and it wouldn't matter, because soon the man would be a corpse, bloodied, defiled and rotting in the earth.

"Shall I go win my daughter to thy will?" she asked.

"And be a happy mother by the deed," he said, a triumphant leer twitching to life on one side of his face.

"I go. Write to me very shortly, and you shall understand from me her mind."

"Bear her my true love's kiss." He leant forward as though to kiss her, his ugly face inches from her own.

She remembered then what Anne had told her. _He gave me nothing_ , she said. _No, not even on the wedding night_. Anne had giggled: a high, hysterical, frightened sound (she was already near her end then). _I think he's a virgin_ , she said.

Elizabeth stood her ground, and Richard didn't move to take the kiss, so all of a sudden, she did. She took his face in both of her hands and planted her lips on his, forcing her tongue between his teeth. For a second he tensed backwards, but then he forced her backwards so he was sitting on top of her, on the groundsheet of his pavilion.

"You slut," he said, spitting the word at her. "You nasty little slut."

I should scream, she thought. I should fight him and escape. He will take me like a soldier takes the maids of a captured town. _But I am the victor here._ And a victor's lust rose within her loins, strange and fierce.

She sat up and slapped his face as hard as she could. "Envious, are you?" she hissed in his ear. "Anne told me you were impotent. She said you wouldn't even get undressed in front of her. Poor baby." She covered his red cheek with little butterfly kisses. "Are you shy?"

He was scrabbling at his netherhose then, pulling out evidence that the impotence jibe was unfounded. "Is this what you want, slut?" he said. "You're that desperate, are you?"

 _Was_ it what she wanted? She who had stood all her life upon her honour? _And where had_ that _got her?_ I am nothing now, and it matters nothing what I do, she told herself. But yes, sick of being done to, she must _do_.

She made a fist and punched him, the way a man punches, on his left shoulder, the one that seemed to hurt him more and more these days. He cried out, and she pushed him backwards, again hitting the same spot, so he was lying on his back on the groundsheet. Kneeling, she straddled his body and lifted her skirts, baring her cunt to him.

He writhed and gaped. She laughed. "Never seen one of these before?" she said.

"You've gone mad," he said, beginning to laugh himself. "My God, you're worse than Margaret."

She took his cock in both of her hands, and pulled, first adeptly, the way Edward had loved it, then hard. He groaned, in ecstasy or agony or both. Then he seized her head, and tried to push it downwards onto him. She twisted free, and laughed again. "Only if you want me to bite it off," she said.

"I'd kill you," he said.

"I wouldn't care," she said.

"I'd kill your daughters," he said.

"You'd have to catch them first."

He sat up and tried to roll her over onto her back, but she fought him, wrestling wildly like she had with her brothers when she was little, biting, scratching. He got the advantage of her and ripped the placket from her gown, baring her breasts, tearing at them like an animal. Then she got the advantage of him, pulling open his doublet so the buttons went flying, then ripping his shirt. His chest was hollow, pale and hairless; a vile and twisted thing.

"You're a monster," she hissed, digging in her nails. "If I gave birth to you, I'd have strangled you before the birth-blood dried, and thrown you on the dungheap for the dogs."

He made a sound like an animal and had her on her back again, then was in her, thrusting deeply, his withered arm hanging obscenely in her face.

She thrust too, pushing against him, and a grotesque image flashed into her mind, of swallowing him up entirely with her cunt, then digesting him and expelling him like so much moonblood.

He came within seconds, and she grabbed his withered arm, twisting it backwards and pushing it away. He spat in her face.

There was more laughter then, neither his nor hers. They both looked up. The pavilion was a mess, with furniture overturned, and spilt ink spreading across the groundsheet. In the entrance stood Queen Margaret, wearing a tattered cotehardie, the red roses faded to pink. She laughed and laughed until she was crying, then heaving, then vomited copiously in front of them both.

"Children," she said, still heaving. "Children playing at kings and queens. Pigs wallowing in filth. Whores and cripples rolling on the floor, tearing each other apart with their fingernails. This is the House of York. This is England now. This is hell, and you are welcome to it." She turned and left, laughing again.


End file.
